Roanna Forman, who covers the Boston jazz landscape for jazz.com, recently reported in this column on performances by , and. Now she reviews Gary Burton and Pat Metheny's concert at Boston’s Berklee Performance Center at Saturday. T.G. Question: How many parts nostalgia and how many parts young base in this up to date concert at Boston’s Berklee Performance Center? Answer: Equal.
"Picking up where they port off," as Steve Swallow wrote, this notable dispose had prodigality redesigned to answer after thirty years, thanks to their own improvisatory powers and the unusual pep of drummer Antonio Sanchez. It was a podium filled with wunderkind-to-doyen phenomena: Gary Burton, who formed the Gary Burton Quartet when he was 24, and is now a jazz icon; Pat Metheny, whose hook-up with Burton and Swallow at stage 20 started a channel to jazz stardom; and Antonio Sanchez, a Berklee evaluator in the 90’s who, enticing a dispassionate glimpse of Gary Burton on campus, never dreamed he’d be playing one date with what he calls "jazz royalty." Looking out over the audience, Burton mused that Berklee Performance Center was the classroom he always imagined playing in while practicing, ill-matched his comrade Michael Brecker, who once confessed to Burton he dreaded it, picturing an army of musicians scrutinizing his every act and note. No such go for Gary Burton at this Boston concert; he couldn’t have had a warmer crowd.
The unfathomable concentration of music students and musicians not gigging that edge of night were as kind-hearted as ever: rising for a prominence applause at opening; yelling out "Perfect!" after Pat Metheny brought "Question and Answer" in for a landing; and registering on the cheers meter the affiliated crowd of drummers, guitarists, bass players (egged on by Swallow to gather their hands), and empathy players ("come on, applaud, both of you," Burton urged.) The concert, limited of a outing that suggested itself when the collect appeared at the Montreal Jazz Festival, centered on tunes done by the Quartet when Pat Metheny joined it. There were songs by bandeau members, as well as latchkey artists of that take adore Chick Corea () and Keith Jarrett ("Coral").
The show was at the same period a retrospective on the era-defining music that contributed to a changed origination of jazz-more electric; incorporating throw elements; and more available to amateur audience’s ears, take a shine to Steve Swallow’s "Como en Vietnam" and Gary Burton’s "Walter L." I can stipulate musically of Burton, Metheny, and Swallow what Gary said himself in his precise, unadorned way, "I into you differentiate everybody but I’m successful to set up them anyway." Burton continues to be technically impeccable. He never labors over his instrument, but mill the four mallets delight in a painter-with the fitting reach here, the promptly mallet undertaking there, to fabricate smoothness, or he’ll the gas furiously up and down its stretch in more excited pieces. Each word choice is as if a sensitive concern that occurs to him, whether he ends mid-measure or completes the elevation down to the aftermost beat.
When the feature turned to Pat Metheny, he would acquaint a fabliau with each solo. Metheny never sounds go for he’s playing over changes even with straight-ahead arrangements. He’s playing more than notes-maybe a cry, a wail, wonder, whatever he feels as he builds the solo. He began the lines of "Question and Answer" playing his archtop, and ended it, as he characteristically does, with guitar synthesizer, playing a leave-no-prisoners alone with the measure stage solidly supporting him. Yet the guitar synth, occupied also on "Walter L," thus distorts Metheny’s tremendous gift.
His musicality is more fully developed and appreciated on the archtop, which is his signature sound. You might impart Steve Swallow has the same sensitivity as Metheny, although the repeal is more accurate, given the chronology. He was in great form, with some especially flimsy soloing on the other correspondence Steve Swallow ever wrote. (We can pay no attention to Gary Burton some true inaccuracy for introducing the air as Swallow’s word go composition. That would be "Eiderdown." Whatever.) Burton, Metheny, and Swallow are a known quantity, with a whopping discography and a synergy one expected to prorogue undamaged onstage, even after many years.
Yet Antonio Sanchez, although he has been recorded with this group, is callow to the mix, so the big quiz was how he changed the group’s sound. Sanchez brought very tight, lyrical playing to this already authoritative unit, and added undoubtedly a suspicion of kick. On slower numbers dig "Olhos de Gato," "B & G," and "Coral," his steadiness kept the tunes calm, with well-placed accents on bass drum and sticks. He was driving hard, and finished the stoned verve tunes sitting back on his seat, with a fighter who had given his strongest knock in the ring.
Sanchez is a powerfully harmonious drummer: you utterly heard the unison to "Como En Vietnam" throughout his great solo, over and above the steady figures. A less skilled drummer might be barely tasteless and fritter the file to the beginning music during a solo. Not surprisingly, destined of these tunes originate the vibraphone better than others. With a metre portion mild as glass, "Coral" shone refulgent as a sunset bell.
Similarly, "Hullo Bolinas" sets off resonance well, and the absolute border was in sync with the sensibility of this lilting, quirky conformity by Steve Swallow. On songs where guitar had a noted place, groove on "Question and Answer" and "Walter L," there tended to be an imbalance in the aspect and you couldn’t learn Gary Burton well enough, which was unfortunate. Besides apparel playing, there were several duets. A subtle swap between Burton and Sanchez on "Syndrome" brought out the percussive qualities of the vibrations and the mellifluous aspects of the drums. The centerpiece duets of the concert featured Burton and Metheny, pairing them in assorted contexts.
With Metheny like a bat out of hell strumming acoustic guitar, Burton laid out an uptempo "Summertime" in 6/8, during which the lighting company was a trace belated switching back to Burton after Pat Metheny’s solo.
No comments:
Post a Comment